Council tax support consultation

This consultation is now closed.

• View a copy of our draft Council Tax support scheme (PDF, 251KB)
• Case studies of how the proposed changes could affect your household (PDF, 244KB) 
• About council tax
• About council tax benefit

The new scheme

The Government is localising the national Council Tax Benefit scheme from 1 April 2013. It is therefore asking councils to develop their own local scheme to help people on low incomes to pay their council tax.

Rules for pensioners will not change under the new scheme, so their entitlement to benefit will not be affected. See the effect of the changes below.

Currently, the Government pays for council tax benefit but this funding is being reduced by 10 per cent from April 2013. We need to decide on the new scheme by December 2012 and it will then come into operation on 1 April 2013. It is very important that you let us know what you think before we make any decisions as they may well affect you.

Effect of the changes

Cheshire West and Chester Council currently pay Council Tax Benefit to some 27,000 households. This number can be divided almost 50:50 between working age (18-65 generally) and non-working age residents (pensioners).

The Government has said that pensioners will continue to qualify for support under the same rules as the current Council Tax Benefit scheme. Any changes will therefore only affect the benefit received by working age claimants.

If there are no changes made to the current system, then the Council will need to increase everyone’s council tax by around 1.7 per cent (£25 per year / 48 pence per week for a band D property) or make savings of £2.6m, which are likely to affect other services. If it is decided to change the current system instead, this will mean that working age people will on average get 20 per cent less help than at present.